This weekend is the finale for the signature gathering phase of the petition to put Referendum 71 on the ballot here in Washington State. A few months ago, Governor Gregoire signed SB5688, which expands Washington’s Domestic Partnership law to include most of the rights of heterosexual marriages.
After that, our opponents have launched a campaign to get Referendum 71 on the November 2009 ballot in order to repeal that bill. As much as they say they are fine with domestic partnerships as long as its “not marriage”, their actions reveal otherwise.
In order to ensure their success, they are misleading the public about what SB5688 really is. SB5688 is about Domestic Partnerships, not marriage. The petition signature gatherers are telling people that this is “marriage”, that this will lead to the issuing of marriage licenses.
Chris Mason from Driving Equality has been filming a documentary while driving across the USA. He happened to be in Port Angeles, Washington and caught this signature gatherer on video.
Check this video out from DrivingEquality:
Here are the facts:
Signature gatherer is incorrectly saying that this is about “marriage” when it is about domestic partnerships.
This is misleading, this is about domestic partnerships not marriage. However in trying to make Referendum 71 a referendum on marriage, their inability to easily qualify the measure shows the growing support for marriage equality in Washington State
He says that “people will be voting on whether or not to give marriage licenses”
No marriage licenses will be given, this is about DP.
He says that this is “not about giving gays the same rights of marriage, but giving marriage”
This is not true, its exactly about giving just SOME OF THE rights of marriage.
He’s misleading people into thinking that this referendum is an attempt to give those rights when really our elected congress-people and our governor have democratically passed these rights into law already.
The referendum seeks to take away those rights.
Another example of this, also at a Wal-Mart, but from Bellingham.
http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20090721/OPINION02/707219988
It’s good to know that at least our opponents are honest, NOT!
